If you are a committed, creative professional and are passionate about making a lasting difference for children, the world’s leading children’s rights organization would like to hear from you.

For 70 years, UNICEF has been working on the ground in 190 countries and territories to promote children’s survival, protection, and development. The world’s largest provider of vaccines for developing countries, UNICEF supports child health and nutrition, good water and sanitation, quality basic education for all boys and girls, and the protection of children from violence, exploitation, and AIDS. UNICEF is funded entirely by the voluntary contributions of individuals, businesses, foundations, and governments.

Background:UNICEF has been innovating for children for more than 70 years. Innovations support the organization’s 157+ country offices in finding solutions for the world’s most vulnerable children. The UNICEF innovation work includes both policy and practice of innovation in UNICEF, and the larger UN. Innovation in UNICEF is defined as “doing something new or different that adds value.” Innovation is a cross-sectoral function that enhances programme and development effectiveness as well as management and is guided in all contexts by UNICEF’s Innovation Principles (http://www.unicefstories.org/principles/). UNICEF is engaged in testing and scaling up new partnerships, technologies, and collaborations in some of the world’s most difficult operating environments.

In January 2016, the Executive Director established UNICEF’s Office of Innovation in order to establish UNICEF’s innovation functions in one office and leverage the increasing initiatives across UNICEF. Through this decision, the Executive Director’s vision is to scale up successes to achieve results for children across the organization. The Executive Director has asked the newly unified innovation team to develop a common, coordinated strategic plan that continues to support creativity and agility while addressing key operational risks and enhances efficiencies and enables increased access to innovations. The newly established Office of Innovation combines:

The Global Innovation Centre (GIC) established in 2014, and focusing on Scale up which looks at expanding the application of proven solutions from one to several countries and regions by UNICEF and partners

Ventures in New York which looks at investing in new solutions with a 0-2 year horizon

Futures in San Francisco: focusing on what is coming in the 2-5 year horizon and works with big tech partners

UNICEF’s OI Scale team is functioning primarily through UNICEF’s Global Innovation Centre and identifies proven solutions with the potential to be implemented at national scale in multiple countries. The GIC provides the leadership and technical support to deploy and scale these up, expanding their application by UNICEF and others from one to several countries and regions, specifically in the following main areas: real-time information, youth engagement, and access to information and infrastructure.

In 2016, the Office of Innovation forged a new collaboration with Programme Division and ICT Division to support the mainstreaming of innovative tools for real-time information systems at the country level. This collaboration focuses primarily on the scaled deployment of RapidPro and transfer of capacity for, expertise in, and ownership of the deployment of RapidPro in support of improved programmatic outcomes.

In addition to these core areas of focus, the GIC / OI Scale team will expand its portfolio in 2017 to include the application of Human Centred Design, 21st century skills development (through UPSHIFT), and innovations in humanitarian action. An Innovation Specialist is required to support the development of critical strategies, partnerships, and deployment models for these new areas of work, as well as the emerging management models for institutional mainstreaming of innovations at scale for every child.Purpose of the Assignment

Purpose of Assignment:Under the management of the Senior Advisor on Innovation / Scale-up Lead, provide strategic guidance and support in the following areas:

Develop global strategy and plan for scaling UPSHIFT in consultation with cross-sectoral specialists, experienced country offices and external partners

Lead gathering and development of the global core content for OpenSourcing.

Lead gathering and development of implementation toolkit and deployment process capturing the lessons learned, pitfalls to avoid and resources to enable the efficient implementation of UPSHIFT by successive countries. Reference existing toolkits and process as relevant.

Liaise closely with innovations partnerships team on shaping and pitching UPSHIFT for financial and non-financial engagement

Liaise closely with innovations communication team on communication efforts for UPSHIFT

Support country offices in implementation of UpShift based on the above, ensure accurate tracking of country scale pipeline (live, pipeline, exploring) and manage project in project management system

Support other strategy work within the GIC, as required

Payment planMonthly payment, based on monthly tasks and progress reports, approved upon monthly review with supervisor.

*Consultant is responsible for his/her own health insurance
*Consultant is eligible for standard in- and out-of-country DSA for all work-related travel

Qualifications or specialized knowledge/experience required for the assignment:

Advanced university degree in Social Sciences, Humanities International Relations or other relevant field and 8 years of professional work experience, 10 years of professional experience work experience in lieu of an advanced degree.

Experience in working on innovation projects/programmes and the facets required to support scale up including communication, multi-stakeholder engagement including private sector, and managing relations with those stakeholders who support; ecosystem engagement.

Experience in working with organizations focused on engaging and empowering adolescents and youth, especially the most marginalized

Experience in working with multiple countries and with multiple stakeholders

Fluency in English is required, strong written and verbal competency is necessary

Please indicate your ability, availability and daily rate (in US$) to undertake the terms of reference above. Applications submitted without a daily rate will not be considered.

UNICEF is committed to diversity and inclusion within its workforce, and encourages qualified female and male candidates from all national, religious and ethnic backgrounds, including persons living with disabilities, to apply to become a part of our organisation.

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About This Site

This site contains a sampling of UNICEF’s Innovation initiatives, resources, media coverage, and first person posts on how UNICEF country offices are creating innovations in programme, process, partnership and product.